Future Of Courthouse Volunteers Is Uncertain

Ruth Abromowitz helped save Palm Beach County taxpayers $2,500, and helped slice lines at the South County Courthouse Complex.

Abromowitz has been spending Tuesdays and Thursdays on the building`s second floor, pulling case files for defendants and pointing them to the correct courtrooms.

``They`ve cut lines in half,`` Monty Kindy, supervisor of the south county clerk`s office, said about the civil court volunteers. ``It really has helped the public . . . We`ve had a crunch here.``

The three-month, $1,000 pilot volunteer program at the Delray Beach complex ended Wednesday. County commissioners are expected to decide Tuesday whether to hire a director for the budding program, which could expand to all county courthouses, or call it quits.

``The program cannot continue unless they hire somebody to direct the program. Any quality program cannot exist without someone who oversees it,`` said Judy Fink, the volunteer consultant who set up the program.

The county clerk supervisor pulled out a log book Wednesday to show the burgeoning workload in his offices.

Criminal court volume is soaring by 53 percent this year, Kindy said, projecting a total of 55,000 transactions by year`s end. Civil court volume is tripling its normal 5-percent increase, projecting 23,000 cases for the year.

``I can`t go out and hire full-time clerks to handle the volume,`` said Kindy, who already hired his quota of eight new employees by Jan. 1. ``As a result, I`m certainly welcoming these volunteers, and their work is just excellent.``

Abromowitz is one of his four volunteers. The retired control clerk for the city of Philadelphia says she enjoys her job.

``If I wanted a full-time job, I think I could get it, but I don`t want to,`` said Abromowitz, of King`s Point. ``The group that`s here is just simply fantastic.``

Carol Dempsey, who clips newspaper articles for Commissioner Dorothy Wilken, said she welcomes her three-day-a-week job because she just moved to South Florida from Lakeland.

``I`m a person who likes to communicate,`` said the Delray Beach resident, ``and it`s very difficult to do that when you`re home alone.``

Twenty volunteers worked at the information desk, the commissioner`s office, the clerk`s office and the planning and zoning department for a total 420 hours in the pilot program, Fink said.

Fink is asking commissioners to give the program to a Health Department volunteer coordinator at a yearly cost of $4,000. The alternative, she said, is to hire a director with a $18,000-to-$25,000 salary. The commission could also decide to end the program.